The engine data monitoring system (EDM) 960 – the one manufactured by J.P. Instruments is available for all aircraft with 4, 6, 7, 8 or 9 cylinders engines. There are so many things in an aircraft that need to be monitored that in days gone by, there used to be a flight engineer whose job it was to keep an eye on the engine performance during flight.
But the flight engineer was only human and during long flights, it was easy to not notice some things. But being a machine albeit an intelligent one; the EDM 960 system electronically surveys everything it is connected to, and it does it four times a second. Nothing can escape its attention.
Some of the characteristics of the EDM 960 System:
The EDM 960 not only reads the data sent to it by the sensors, it has the ability to compare that data with extreme values pre-entered into the system by the pilots and; in the event that any sensor reading of the aircraft engine does not confirm to the pre-entered values, it will trigger an audio-visual warning.
Apart from this, if you plug the appropriate GPS, it can calculate time-to-empty in real time based on actual fuel in the tank. It can compute distance, calculate fuel requirement (based on current fuel use rate), compare fuel requirement with available fuel and display data on whether you can make it to a way-point or not.
The EDM 960 System acts like your very own flight engineer – one that never feels drowsy or sleeps during a flight.
Specifications of the EDM 960 Twin System manufactured by J.P. Instruments:
1. Lean Find™ finds the first and last cylinder to peak with true peak detect eliminates false peaks
2. Hands-free, automatic scanning
3. Displays both leaned temperature below peak and peak
4. All programming done from the Front Panel
5. Battery voltage with alarm
6. Programmable alarm limits
7. Amperes (load or charge/discharge meter)
8. Normalize view
9. DIF low to high EGT with alarm
10. Exhaust Gas Temperatures (EGTs) to stable 1°F resolution
11. EGTs to stable 1°F resolution 12. User selectable index rate
13. Shock cooling monitored on every cylinder
14. Fast response probes
15. Records and stores data up to 30 hours
16. Non-volatile long-term memory
17. Post-flight data retrieval
18. Data retrieval software
19. Download to Palm™ Computer
20. Fuel level display
21. Oil pressure
22. Outside air temperature
23. Oil temperature
24. Adjustable display
25. Adjustable order of display
Other characteristics of the EDM 960 System include:
Display via liquid crystal display (LCD) screen as well as remote auxiliary display (RAD) (if connected).
The default displays of the EDM 960 System include fuel pressure, oil pressure, oil temperature, bus voltage amps, fuel flow (left and right separately), and outside air temperature.
Without doubt, the EDM 960 is an invaluable safety device for the pilot and his aircraft. It helps diagnose engine malfunctions, adjust air-to-fuel mixture, provide real time feedback on the critical components of the Aircraft Engine Monitor as well as diagnose air craft position vis-a-viz destination and compare it to fuel status (provided you have the right GPS installed).
You can find more information here: https://www.jpinstruments.com/shop/edm-960/
Aircraft Engine Data Management 